Daily Mail Article

[linesrg]

Good evening All,

This item was linked on the Renault Zoe Owners Facebook page - https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-6225039/Nissan-Leafs-range-just-160-miles-good-luck-finding-charging-point-works.html

It strikes me that the driver was using the wrong vehicle to make this particular journey. There is no indication that any significant advance planning was done.

There is still an issue that defective charging points aren't more readily obvious on such as the ChargePlace Scotland (or equivalent page). There should be some self-checking software or activation after failure notifications from users like myself.

Regards

Richard

[brackwell]

She does highlight a very serious problem ,the unreliability of the charging network.
I do however wonder if she was using zap map as i think that would have premptied this situation and made her recharge in Carlisle on a rapid charger.

[kristen]

There is no indication that any significant advance planning was done.

"I stopped at Todhills Services in Cumbria to top up but found that the charge point was offline.
Fortunately, I had enough power left to reach the next service station, at Gretna — only to find on arrival that neither of its charge points was working"

That might well have been the advance planning? Quite frankly I don't know how any EV owner manages with 3rd party public charging on out-of-range-trips. On the, admittedly relatively few, occasions I've used one I can't remember a single time that it was plain-sailing. My best attempts were where some of the Posts were out-of-order but there was one that was free and working, but i don't rate that as 5-star because of the adjacent failure. Typically the connect and disconnect time has been "unreasonable" (faffing around of some sort, either waiting for the APP to go chug-chug-chug or having to call the Provider and get them to help)

if I look on Plugshare the crowd-sourced reports of failure are frequent, but of course not every success (or failure) is logged, so no way of knowing how good/bad the situation really is (and that also means that real-time planning of a trouble-free recharging location is not possible).  But even at sites where all Posts working I've been unable to connect, had to phone up, and on some of those occasions remote-start hasn't been possible (even though the operator was expecting it to be, so presumably no "fault logged" on their system)

Its bad news to hear that Dale / Ecotricity is scaling back maintenance because of lack of use ... it doesn't bode well for rollout of 150+kW CCS charger network unless something changes.

Why do these things break down at all or need much in the way of maintenance? I've never seen physical damage (although that must happen of course), so presumably the faults could be rectified by "better / more reliable equipment"?

I think PHEV is the way forwards, short term. No range anxiety, and far more vehicles, with smaller batteries (say 40kWh), will increase the overall miles-on-'Leccy and benefits from less fossil fuel

[oliver90owner]

 Theris, perhaps, a difference between improving the connectivity across the country and charging exorbitant unit costs.  My impression is that his unit costs are close to dino prices per mile travelled?

[JohnS]

There are many different charge point providers all requiring you to sign up to their service with monthly fees etc and not being able to use each others charge points.  Also different charging plugs and leads.  It is the most confusing thing about plug in cars.

I have never understood Dale Vince's business model for Ecotricity's charging points.

As far as I can see, he was attempting to become a monoploy provider at motorway service stations and then presumably to increase his prices.  Already his prices, especially minimum charges, makes it uneconomic to charge my PHEV on the road instead of using its ICE.

It is about time something was done to make all charging points available to all motorists by using contactless credit cards and sensible pricing. 

[kristen]

My impression is that his unit costs are close to dino prices per mile travelled?

I don't have a problem with that, per se. My away-from-home charging is 10-ish% (of total used). (My range is 220 real-world miles, and I'm out-of-range about 2 days per month). Provider has to recoup capital cost etc. and (as I understand it) wholesale electricity price can be dependent on peak-demand, so with (say) 4 pumps at 50kW that runs the risk of hitting a 200kW peak (unless batteries installed to smooth-the-load, but then that's more capital cost to have to recoup)

I don't charge at e.g. Supermarket for the weekly-shop because I can charge at home, and I don't need the top-up; even if it was cheap/free I think it would be better that I leave that Pump for someone that needs it (for range).

Of course to get to that point EVs need a "reasonable range".

It is about time something was done to make all charging points available to all motorists by using contactless credit cards and sensible pricing. 

maybe there is hope?

The law requires that this is sorted out - "an infrastructure operator must ensure that all recharging points for which that operator is responsible incorporate intelligent metering systems (defined as a) displays to the person using the recharging point the time of its use; b)is secure with regard to data sent from and to it.) and infrastructure operators must ensure their recharging points provide ad-hoc access for electric vehicle users[defined as the ability for any person to recharge an electric vehicle without entering into a pre-existing contract with electricity supplier / infrastructure operator)"

That applies to all "new" Pumps after Nov-2017 and existing ones no later than 18-Nov-2018

Not sure we are home-and-dry because, for example, some operators appear to be getting around this by allowing registration of any RFID (e.g. a bank card) - so meets the adhoc requirement and BP is trying to do the whole brand-loyalty thing by taking out a subscription to their service.

If I had, say, 400 real-world mile range I wouldn't need to charge away from home from one year to the next ... and IMO Rapid Chargers wouldn't see much use (or the ones in the existing rollout will suffice for a much bigger large-battery fleet). At the least the only people who would want a subscription service at that point would be long distance drivers, and folk with no "at home" charging facilities.

[phoooby]

I rely on Polar Chargmaster and Instavolt now for all my away from home charging. I pay the subscription to Polar (which is less than most pay to tax their car at £95 pa) and get car access to reliable chargers so no app and connectivity issues. Elec is 10.8p so same as I pay at home but delivered at 45kw + rate.  Instavolt is payg via chip and pin so just as easy as Polar without a subscription to pay but 35p per kw so more expensive (if you get charged as they seem to be on free vend at the moment). With those two, I find I can cover all the journeys I need to make. 

I have completely given up with EH. I used them a few times in 2015-2016 with my first leaf but they are just too unreliable to plan any journey around. Perhaps I have been lucky with Polar as they are only single unit installations but the tie up with BP will no doubt improve that and increase the options.

Ecotricity need to hand over the reigns of EH to someone with access to the capital to make the EH what it should be in this day an age. The more DM articles stating how unreliable charging is, the slower uptake will be and EH are just contributing to delaying uptake with their shoddy service.

[stannn]

Dale Vince appears on the latest ‘fully charged’ on YouTube. He says that the software has been upgraded to cure the problems.
Stan

[DonL]

Theris, perhaps, a difference between improving the connectivity across the country and charging exorbitant unit costs.  My impression is that his unit costs are close to dino prices per mile travelled?

These high? costs are of the order of 30p/kwh. My Leaf does 4.8miles per kwh so 6.25p/mile.
Petrol £1.30/litre so £5.85/gallon; say 50miles per gallon 11.7p/mile - quite a long way from parity unless you achieve over 90miles/gallon.
Sorry to mix units and include the old imperial but many people, including me, still think in miles/gallon, despite being fully metricated since school days 50 years ago!

[skyewright]

In this week's BBC R4 Costing the Earth (https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m0000mjy) Peter Gibbs has some issues with unusable charging points.

The programme looks at the practicalities of EV ownership. Peter has had one for quite a few years and, among other things, the programme follows him on his way to & from a Gardeners Question Time recording. He also meets Robert Llewellyn, described as 'the man behind the electric car Youtube channel, Fully Charged'.

[Philip R]

It is not just the electricity cost, but the dispenser O & M costs including standing charges to include council tax or land rent too. If I owned a charging station, I would be charging enough to try and make a PROFIT.

Philip R